Does Xbox One need Kinect?

A little over a month of the launch of the new Xbox One, his arrival in Portugal is not the only question that continues to haunt the minds of players who have shown interest in purchasing the new home console from Microsoft.

I want it for the other services it potentially will offer through Skype and potentially other services like being able to scan in an object and create a 3D world for my kids to interact with (becoming a character in a learning game) or trade objects (Skylander type toys) with others in their living room.

My wife will use it for exercising (Kind of benefits us both) and watching TV, Skyping to her sisters, and gaming with her friends.

Do we need Kinect to work with current games? Probably not. Do we want it for other services that it will bring to the living room, Yes. There's lots of potential that will come with the Kinnect that will not be available on the PS4 simply because indy devs will make things I haven't thought of because everyone has it. If you don't want to use it, disconnect it, but my entire family intends to use it.

Developers don't care how many Kinects are out there, they care about how many people use Kinect. Any develpoer that incorporates Kinect in their games is going to look at its popularity by use, not by numbers. 20 million Kinects doesn't mean squat if only 1 million are plugged in and being used. If I bought an Xbone and didn't use Kinect why would developers be more inclined to use it? In fact, any game that incorporates Kinect could potentially be a turn off to those that don't like or want to use Kinect. Demand for Kinect is what matters and MS can't force demand. No developer is going to spend time and money implementing Kinect fnctionality (and risk making the game an Xbone exclusive) if demand for the functionality isn't there and could potentialy turn customers off.

It does matter that there is a Kinect on every console simply because as a developer I know that there isn't any additional cost associated with my game for end users to purchase. There are a number of people who might buy a game for say $10 that wouldn't if that game costs $10 + $100 for a Kinect. It also means that many devs could make smaller cheaper games that might not be AAA or even AA titles, but could be a short fun game for kids that could make money and cost less than a full title. Many parents would be willing to pay $5-10 on a simple game but not for a $40-$60 title. As a result you may see many quick and simple unique titles that could come out on the Xbox One, but not on the PS4. Look at how cheap Mobile Games are flourishing in that environment. Why couldn't the same happen on the console market? I think you guys are looking at it from your Hard Core gamer lens and not from an average consumer's POV.

As for the adoption rate for the Kinect, 20 Million sold is nothing to laugh at. Yes many of those people felt that it went nowhere (myself included), but all of those users could have bought a system without it, but didn't. I think it was a system ahead of its time. The hardware just wasn't there to properly handle the idea, but based on what I've seen from demo videos, it may be that the system will be good enough to provide the type of experiences the devs want to give. Time will tell.

Developers will know that every X1 comes with Kinect so if they want to implement an optional Kinect feature that adds something new to the gameplay they can because it's there.

MS also spent as much money on the Kinect sensor tech as they did on the whole X1. So with all that money and time invested why would they want to offer a skew without it? If you don't want it then turn it off and if that's not good enough buy a PS4 - simple.

Btw, are you a developer? If not, why talk about things that you don't know? My original post was based off an article that I read a while back where MS was explaining why they felt Kinect was so important to the X1 experience.